Battery Life

My daughter lives in Austin, TX. She has a 2012 Civic and needed a new battery about two years ago. This week she had to jump the battery a few times and I told her have the battery checked.

The guy at Autozone told her that it was bad and in general batteries only last about two years down there.

It's under warranty from the dealer, so it's not like Autozone is going to sell her one.

Up her in the frosty northeast, I generally get 4-5 years out of a battery and thought that this was the norm.

Does the heat kill batteries that fast in the south?

 

Heat is the worst thing for batteries. A couple of years in Austin is about all you're going to get with most batteries.

 

Sadly he is not far off. Few years is about average in crazy heat

 

Thanks guys. Not that I'm skeptical, but sometimes she is a bit too trusting and I wanted to confirm what she was told.

 

Heat is way harder on batteries. Most cold weather batteries last on average 5 years, hot weather is 1-3 years.

 

the major factor on battery life is recovery

from the time U crank it....................to the time it becomes fully charged

if cranked run only 30min commute ( actually the average yet Not long enuf )
unlikely its fully charge

no less lifestyle might allow several trips during the day
resulting in the batt being in deficit

next round of daily living & the battery starts where it left off
the alternator starts charging yet
the duration of drive still doesnt allow batt to catch up

gradually over time the batt is & pretty much stays in deficit

4 te years i had a mid day commute ...................didnt even have to stop until i got to work
first set o brakes went 120k miles
batt was always hot...........lasted over 7 years

40 mins hi-way speed always kept batt up

 

As others have said, heat is the death of a battery. A typical battery location in an engine bay is double bad. Not unusual to have a battery loose capacity in 2 years in hot climates.

 

The OEM battery in my Tacoma was going good after 10+ years; I replaced it out of caution. The wife's 2016 RAV4 battery needed replacing this spring. Guess the Tacoma was lucky.

 

Wow!! That’s impressive. I don’t live in any place that gets much above 90 and it’s rare. I got a year and a half and 35k miles out of my stock one

 

Yes heat kills batteries, but I'm thinking 2 years isn't acceptable. It gets pretty hot here in GA, It will hit triple digits quite often July through September and I normally get 5-7 years out of one. But with most anything electrical it can be hard to predict. Some stuff dies quickly for no apparent reason, others last longer.

The factory battery on my Tacoma lasted 8 years. The replacement only 2, but the current one is 3 years old. The battery in my Honda has been in there 7 years and I got 6 years out of the one in my F150.

 

Something today’s batteries have to deal with, and it will only get worse is parasitic draw. As bad as heat is that slow draw takes a toll.

If you don’t drive almost daily, and long enough to fully recharge the battery a battery maintainer would be a wise investment.

 

Check the water in your cells periodically, I always need to add a little distilled water in the 2 cells adjacent to the pos and neg post. My truck is always outside and it’s a cooker under my mgm hood.

 

s o m e of the new tech batteries dont have the longevity

theyve been tested & found to be so.....................weve brought them in as backups by truckloads to routing centers
they simply have a short shelf life
no less when called to duty last run significantly short of specs

the older lead/acid ' wet ' batteries were inconvenient yet

at my company we had them last decades..................worked there 25+years
never saw 1 replaced